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Cucumber Catsup

A pickled relish of cucumbers, peppers, onions, celery seed, mustard seed, and cider vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Cucumber Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove seeds from cucumbers and peppers, then dice them all into small pieces.

  2. Add a handful of coarse sea salt and place the mixture in a cheesecloth bag to drain for 12 hours.

  3. Once drained, add ½ pint each of celery and mustard seed.

Pack and mature

  1. Pack the mixture into stone jars and cover with good cider vinegar, ensuring it is well mixed.

  2. Cover the jars tightly and set them aside for 6 weeks to mature.

Serve

  1. Serve on cold meats or enjoy as a pickle.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Provide the bulk of the relish, contributing fresh, crisp texture once diced and drained.
Green peppers
Add bulk and a grassy, slightly bitter note to the mixture.
White onions
Add pungent flavour that mellows during the long maturing period.
Cider vinegar
Acidifies the mixture, adding tang and helping preserve it during maturing.
Mustard seed
Adds sharp, pungent flavour and a slight crunch to the relish.

The step that matters

Draining with salt for 12 hours. Salt draws water out of the cucumbers, peppers and onions by osmosis. Draining this liquid keeps the finished relish from becoming watery and helps it stay crisp rather than soggy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, pepper, celery, mustard, cider, vinegar):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Lettucefits better
  3. Radishfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, pepper, celery, mustard, cider, vinegar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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